Randy Scruggs Shines On First Solo Album

May 29, 1998|Tribune Media Services

One of the most hugely and diversely talented people in Nashville is producer/song writer/guitarist Randy Scruggs, which fact is going to be dramatically underscored in July when Warner Bros. is scheduled to release Scruggs' first solo album.

The collection amasses a horde of top-name talent, from Vince Gill, Travis Tritt and Bruce Hornsby to Joan Osborne, Rosanne Cash and Iris DeMent. It not only features Scruggs' sizzlingly masterful guitar, several of his own songs and his tasteful production ear, but it also sports his Bob Dylan-influenced voice on a few of the tracks.

Showing how Scruggs' musical sensibilities grew from his initial training by his banjo-playing father in the Earl Scruggs Revue to his enjoyment of other genres, the collection's material ranges from the fiddle standard A Soldier's Joy and his father's own white-hot bluegrass Lonesome Ruben to Steve Goodman's The City of New Orleans and Pure Prairie League's Amie.